Texas synagogue: Brother urged hostage-taker to surrender

The British gunman who held four people hostage in a Texas synagogue was urged to surrender by his brother in their final phone call, it has emerged.

An audio recording of the conversation was obtained by the Jewish Chronicle.

In the call, which gunman Malik Faisal Akram made to his family in Blackburn as the siege was going on, he tells his brother he has "come to die".

Two men were arrested in Manchester and Birmingham on Thursday morning in relation to the attack, police said.

Akram, 44, was shot dead by the FBI after the 10-hour standoff in Colleyville, near Dallas, with all four hostages unharmed.

He had entered the Congregation Beth Israel synagogue during a morning service by pretending to be homeless, before pulling out a gun.

• Hostage-taker was known to MI5

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In the clip Akram can be heard giving an anti-Semitic rant as his mental state deteriorates and the tension inside the synagogue increases.

It also reveals the efforts made by Akram's brother Gulbar to get him to surrender - as he tries repeatedly to talk him into giving himself up, telling him that his hostages are innocent people and asking him to think about his children.

But the gunman tells his brother he has set his heart on dying and he wants to "go down as a martyr".

"I've only been here two weeks and I've got them all at gunpoint," he says, later adding: "I'm coming back home in a body bag."

The recording of the phone call was obtained from a security source, the Jewish Chronicle says. The BBC is unable to vouch for its authenticity but experts believe it to be genuine.

The incident began at about 11:00 local time (17:00 GMT) on Saturday

In a barely coherent rant, thick with four-letter expletives, Akram rails against Jews and US military actions in the Middle East.

He repeatedly calls for convicted Pakistani neuroscientist Aafia Siddiqui, imprisoned in nearby Fort Worth, to be released. She is serving an 86-year prison sentence over attempts to kill US soldiers in Afghanistan.

Akram also tells his brother: "I've prayed to Allah for two years for this."

MI5 had investigated Akram 18 months ago but decided he did not pose a risk to national security.

He had been on the British security service's watchlist as a "subject of interest" in 2020 and was investigated in the second half of that year.

But by 2021 Akram, who had a criminal record in the UK, had moved from the active list to the "former subject of interest" list and was no longer considered a threat.

The clip obtained by the Jewish Chronicle is pretty shocking, in a way it's almost voyeuristic.

You are hearing the last words of a man who is going to be shot soon after, and who is clearly in a disturbed mental state.

The really crucial thing, I think, is he says he has been praying for two years for this.

MI5, Britain's domestic security agency, investigated him for four weeks in the latter part of 2020 and decided that he was not a threat to national security.

So unless Malik Faisal Akram has got his dates wrong, which I think unlikely, he was able to hide his intentions during that investigation, which is worrying.

It does not necessarily mean that MI5 did an incompetent job, it means he was able to keep his intentions secret. He didn't show the signs then of what he intended to do.

More than a year went by between MI5 closing their investigation of Akram and him setting off to the US to carry out this attack. So this was clearly something that had been brewing in his mind for some time.

He is thought to have arrived in the US via New York's JFK International Airport two weeks prior to the siege, according to police sources, and is believed to have bought weapons used in the incident "on the street" after his arrival.

Akram's brother Gulbar has apologised to the victims, and has said his brother was suffering from mental health issues.

Friends of Akram in Blackburn also said his mental health had been getting worse and expressed surprise that he had been able to travel to the US.

US President Joe Biden described the hostage-taking as "an act of terror", while UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss called it "anti-Semitism" - a view echoed by the Muslim Council of Britain which expressed its solidarity with the Jewish community.

Greater Manchester Police said the pair who were arrested on Thursday remained in custody for questioning.

Two teenagers who were previously arrested in south Manchester as part of the investigation have since been released without charge.